Shared Values and Soft Power: How to Deal with the Importance of Gender Issues

FRS is pleased to invite you to a webinar entitled “Shared Values and Soft Power: How to Deal with the Importance of Gender Issues”, which will be held online on Wednesday, February 08, from 10:00 am to 11:00 am (CET). The aim of this debate is to better understand French and Japanese views on gender issues through the voices and opinions of researchers from both countries as well as to discuss how the two countries can cooperate in this field. 

Program:

10:00 am - 10:40 am
Moderator
Valérie Niquet, Director of Japan Program, FRS

Speakers
Asako OSAKI, Gender Specialist, Director, Gender Action Platform
Mar MERITA BLAT, Gender Expert, Agence Française de Développement (AFD) 

10:40 am – 11:00 am 
Q&A session

Biographies of speakers

Asako Osaki: Gender Specialist, Director, Gender Action Platform

Asako Osaki is a recognized gender expert with over 25 years of professional experience at global, national and local levels. After receiving a Master of International Affairs from the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, she served at the United Nations Development Programme and promoted gender equality and women’s empowerment worldwide. With that experience, Asako now works with government, civil society, and private sector to promote gender equality in Japan.

Mar Merita Blat: Gender Expert, Agence Française de Développement (AFD) 

After a Master in International Affairs from Sciences Po Paris, Mar Merita Blat specializes in gender equality with a second master's degree on this subject in Spain. Her professional background is characterized by thematic expertise on gender, in a diversity of employment structures in the public sector at international, national and local levels. She is a civil servant in the French Ministry of Women's Rights, and worked as project manager at Expertise France for the gender component of a European cooperation program in Latin America. She is currently in charge of external relations and partnerships on gender equality at AFD in the Social Link Division. Mar has published and built tools on masculinities, gender stereotypes, the fight against violence against women, public policies on equality and the impact of laws on equality between women and men. At the associative level, Mar Merita Blat was a member of Ni Putes Ni Soumises, of Osez le Féminisme, then administrator and advocacy vice-president of UN Women France between 2014 and 2019.

Crédit image : SurfsUp/Shutterstock.com